‘Matthew did not deserve to die’: Coroner’s inquest hears from Mahoney’s brother on day one

On the first day of the coroner’s inquest into his brother’s death, Michael Mahoney described Matthew as an intelligent and generous person.

“In the end, the mental illness won but that's not how we should be remembering him,” said Michael, who described a brother who was still helping his elderly neighbour long after mental illness affected him.

Michael was the first to speak at the coroner’s inquest Monday and spent a lot of time focusing on the 33 years of Matthew's life instead of the final 33 seconds of it.

Mahoney was fatally shot in a March 2018 incident involving two Windsor police officers.

Michael is hoping the proceedings, which feature 18 speakers, will help the jury make this inquest his brother's final act of service so he can rest easy.

“He was community service-oriented,” Michael said. “He took care of people. He gave everything he had to people.”

Michael brought up two recommendations for the jury to consider in helping to avoid future police/civilian confrontations leading to death.

“At the end of the day police shouldn't have to be providing mental health services. That's not their job,” he said.

Michael feels mental health services are being held back by restrictive policies, procedures and lack of funding. Leaving, what he feels are, under-trained officers vulnerable.

“An officer shouldn't have to guess. An officer should be trained so there is no such thing as a novel or new interaction and they should know exactly what to do in every situation,” he said.

Michael stated automatic ongoing follow-up care is needed for those with certain risk factors and urged residents to demand changes. He recommends a four-year training program similar to Norway’s policing model and strongly believes Canadian officers should also receive more de-escalation training.

Referring to Mahoney’s case, a Windsor police lawyer spoke about an officer having two to three seconds to react to the presumed knife attack. When asked to confirm if officers had their taser pulled, Michael countered by saying the scenario proves his point that pulling a taser is considered an escalation to someone scared of the police.

“We see in other countries that officers have extensive training and because of that training they don't need to make split-second decisions,” he said. “They don't need to guess what to do next.”

Special Investigations Unit (SIU) forensic officer Hank Thorne was the first to testify Monday afternoon explaining the crime scene and events leading up to it.

The inquest resumes Tuesday morning.